With the advances in immunochemistry, there has been an increasing and recently accelerated need for more efficient and less expensive methods and techniques for conducting immunoassays. In many fields of endeavor in molecular biology, biochemistry, biology and genetics, it is necessary to conduct hundreds or even thousands of immunological assay procedures in order to accomplish a single result.
In the clinical treatment of immunological diseases and disorders, it is very desirable to conduct any necessary immunological assays quickly, inexpensively and efficiently in order that the time of the patient and the physician may not be wasted by long delays and repeated visits. There is, accordingly, a long-felt need for more accurate, less expensive, simpler and more efficient immunological assay procedures and apparatus for use in the physician's office or in the clinical laboratory. A large number of immunological detector mechanisms, techniques and materials have been developed over the past decade. The now classical radioimmunoassay technique is still very widely used, though it is being replaced with other techniques which use non-radioactive indicators. Enzyme linked immunoassay techniques, for example, and other photometric, fluorophotometric and colorimetric methods are also applicable to particular species of immunological components. While these advances have made the relatively rapid and accurate assay of antigens and antibodies quite feasible, the need for still more accurate, and simultaneous inexpensive and efficient apparatus and methods has gone unfilled, both in the research laboratory and in the clinical laboratory.
Existing immunoassay technologies are frequently so complicated or time-consuming that a technician is able to run only a very limited number of assays per day. On the other hand, in a clinical laboratory, as an example, the number of assays to be run during a particular day may not justify setting up and operating the apparatus for conducting the assay. Sometimes, in such circumstances, technicians allow patient samples to accumulate until there are enough samples to justify the labor of running the assay. In many clinical situations, such as in the instance of a suspected heart attack, it is distinctly detrimental to the patient if there are any delays or any inconveniences intrinsic in the assay technology. Rapid and accurate assays in such instances are vital to the health of the patient.
This invention comprises a system which overcomes, fully or in large extent, all of the foregoing disadvantages of the prior art.